Distro Hopping

[sqlpython]

 As one who also uses Gentoo.. the developers there have led the way in the past to OpenRC.
If Debian's future OSes make the procedures more difficult to cling to a sysVinit system there is the OpenRC option. I have used systemd with arch and it is at least OK. I just didn't see the need for the move.
Take a look here http://systemd-free.org/
There you will read one method for switching a systemd to an OpenRC. While some might not to actually proceed down that road what can learn is of interest.

As to speed.. many of us have already seen this side by side boot video ..Systemd vs OpenRC

[Snap]

About speeds, systemd shuts down faster than anything else. No doubts. But at boot it depends a lot on specific systems, what and how many services you launch, the hardware, etc... Simple systems (the ones I tend to use) into decently powerful machines don't use to see a specially noticeable improvement with parallelization. I've tested some systems with all equal excepting inits. Even the plain sysvinit with no OpenRC is very fast and not far behind systemd. Only slightly slower. For complex systems that's a different story. systemd and/or parallelization in general can speed up booting times a lot.

In my particular case booting speeds are not relevant. Doesn't make a significative difference whatever the init system you use. At least the ones I've tried. There are plenty available not specially known.

[sqlpython]

 I don't define systemd shutdown as a shutdown...
It is more a Crash 
  which is why it is so fast...  just a bit of kidding..
My primary dislike of systemd as writer of scripts is that sysvinit uses easily editable shell scripts in /etc for config, while systemd uses binary modules..
  If you don't need or like to modify system scripts to meet your needs then a user won't car much about the differences..
  Other then that .. using those binary files and calling them at the cli than systemd works just fine for most purposes.
   

[Snap]

My primary dislike of systemd as writer of scripts is that sysvinit uses easily editable shell scripts in /etc for config, while systemd uses binary modules..

In fact all inits I know use editable scripts excepting systemd. But systemd is not an init system. It stopped being one a while ago. It's a nested system controller which also happens to have an init embedded. That's my primary dislike (independently or how good or bad it can work).